The arrival of “The Sopranos” in 1999 can be credited with ushering in the current era of television, which has become a golden age for scripted programs. These series have breathed new life into adult drama, a genre that had been expiring in the movies. These series have also proved to be a […] Continue reading »

What do you do once you’ve written a play? How do you move it toward production? Dramatists posed those questions to renowned playwright and screenwriter John Patrick Shanley (Moonstruck, Doubt) during a visit to Seattle four years ago. “Don’t wait for someone to produce it. Go put it up on […] Continue reading »

My blog has profiled enough stage directors that those pieces are starting to look like a series. As a basis for these profiles I often use interviews conducted by New York producer Ken Davenport and posted as podcasts on his blog The Producer’s Perspective. I pay attention to directors because they are […] Continue reading »

Failure is a stranger to no artist. I need no reminder; failure stares back at me every day. But if I were so oblivious as to need reminding, reviews of John Patrick Shanley’s newest play could do the job. This would be the same writer whose screenplay for “Moonstruck” won […] Continue reading »

Trump’s election so surprised and confused me that I have undertaken some political soul-searching. How could a loudmouth, fibbing, narcissistic, fear-mongerer have been preferred by enough Americans to get elected for the most powerful job in the world? Was Neil Gorsuch really worth that price? Am I that out of […] Continue reading »

The 2018 federal budget proposed by the White House called for the elimination – elimination, not reduction – of the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. I guess the swamp Trump vowed to drain includes the arts. Last month […] Continue reading »

I hold good accountants (and bookkeepers, for that matter) in high regard. My business career taught me that the true health of a company or business line is found in its financial numbers, not its marketing materials. Some accountants possess an uncanny knack for finding insights in financial statements and […] Continue reading »

Do you remember those inflight telephones that airlines introduced 15 years ago or so? They were embedded in the seatbacks, had a retractable cable, and you paid for the service by sliding a credit card through a slot in the phone. This innovation I dreaded. I was a frequent flyer […] Continue reading »

How much control do we have over what happens to us? Do you believe that your life is controlled by yourself or by external factors such as fate, God, genes, predestination, people with more power? “Locus of control” is a concept in psychology that addresses how we answer that question. […] Continue reading »

I and fellow Seattle playwright John C. Davenport founded Red Rover Theatre Company last year in order to put our own work up on stage. So far we have produced a play of John’s last October and a production of my new play Das Ende just closed. Our bold and, […] Continue reading »